Arts Council Holds Acting Class

An acting class beginning Wednesday night could help prepare aspiring actors to audition for two upcoming community performances. In November, the Arts Council will put on a play called “It Happens Every Summer.”

Acting class teacher, Jared Griffin, says they’ll need a cast of 30 for the play, which is set in the 1960s.

“It’s about a group of college interns who come to work at a teenage fashion / lifestyle magazine in Manhattan, and it’s kind of like the era of Mad Men meets the Devil Wears Prada, but it’s a zany romantic comedy.”

He says they’ll hold auditions in late August.

For those more musically inclined, the Arts Council is also putting on “Disney’s Mary Poppins” in March. Auditions for that will be in December.

The Arts Council is hoping to inspire some people to join community theater through its acting class.

Griffin says the course will be physical and fun. It’ll also cover acting technique, like how to use body language. Griffin says characters fall on a spectrum of status in relation to each other.

“If you’re on top, if you’re the one controlling the scene, if you’re the authority in the scene, you’re going to look and carry and walk differently than you will in another scene when you’re not the top dog. So, it’s how do you interpret a scene to understand where is your place in that scene, and how do you respond to communicate the most appropriate emotional reaction to what’s going on?”

The class will continue over six sessions of $15 dollars each. The first begins Wednesday night in the Gerald C. Wilson Auditorium Drama Pod at 7 p.m. Griffin says aspiring actors can drop by for one or all of the classes.